Ordinary bank transfers will be suspended from 2 to 7 April in all EU countries that adopt the euro as their currency. There is nothing to worry about in reality: it is not a technical problem, but an already planned pause of the Target2 platform, which regulates transfers between European banking institutions of the Eurosystem.
This suspension had already been established for some time, as also confirmed by the European Central Bank which several months ago published a calendar with all the dates of suspension of the service, which also include the Easter holidays.
This “block”, in reality, will be in force from 3 April (Good Friday) to 6 April (Easter Monday) inclusive: given that the system closes the working day at 6pm, all ordinary transfers entered after 6pm on 2 April will be executed on the morning of 7 April.
However, during this time period, ordinary transfers will not be cancelled, but simply suspended and processed when the platform is reactivated. This pause, however, risks lengthening the crediting times of salaries, pensions and scheduled payments. However, the option of instant transfers remains active and will continue to work 24 hours a day.
Why this “blockade” was planned and the alternatives
As also reported by the Bank of Italy, i ordinary bank transfers, i.e. those that take a few days to process, consist of a series of steps that require regulation between banks. The whole process happens through Target2 (acronym for Trans-European Automated Real-time Gross settlement Express Transfer system), the platform that allows credit institutions to exchange money in euros directly and securely, settling transactions between banks. In the event that the system stops or does not work, however, this final regulation cannot take place and the transition remains suspended, only to be completed on the first available day.
This is exactly what will happen during these Easter holidays: the money will not be blocked, the transfer will simply be suspended and then executed on April 7th.
Given its importance, however, the platform is subjected to periodic maintenance interventions “with the aim of improving the services offered and introducing new technical and business features”, which are scheduled during the holidays, when the flow of bank transfers tends to be lower.
In any case, for those who need to make bank transfers during these dates, there are alternatives: more specifically, the suspension will only block ordinary transfers, while instant ones will continue to work. This is because instant transfers – which since last year have had the same cost as ordinary ones – remain operational because they use a different platform, TIPS, which is active 24 hours a day. Likewise, monetary transfers between accounts of the same bank, which do not use the system for Target2, also remain active.
The calendar of the next suspensions according to the ECB
Both the Bank of Italy and the European Central Bank report on their websites the calendar of suspensions of the Target2 platform, which is operational from Monday to Friday, except on the following days:
- January 1st (New Year).
- Easter Friday (Easter Friday).
- Easter Monday.
- May 1st (Workers’ Day).
- December 25 (Christmas).
- 26 December (Boxing Day).
In the early hours of April 7, at the end of the suspension of the system, all the accumulated operations will be processed: the platform is still designed to manage large volumes of traffic, even if it may suffer from slowdowns. The advice, at this point, is to plan ordinary bank transfers in advance or, possibly, resort to the option of instant bank transfers.
